How to Break Free of Negative Thought Spirals
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摘要
Why do we replay cryptic emails, small workplace slights, and past business decisions over and over in our heads? Science journalist Donna Jackson Nakazawa has looked deep into the research and discovered the hidden brain mechanisms that get us into these loops. She explains why a need for achievement, as well as modern work culture, make the problem worse. And she shares practical techniques for recognizing when reflection has crossed into rumination, interrupting destructive thought patterns, and helping teams create more psychological clarity and safety. Nakazawa is author of “Mind Drama: The Science of Rumination and How to Outwit Your Inner Defeatist”.
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中英文字稿 
我是艾莉森·比尔德。我是艾迪·伊格纳修斯，这里是《哈佛商业评论》播客。艾迪，你知道“反刍”这个词的起源吗？我确实知道。它来源于反刍动物，就是那些我们喜爱的整天反复咀嚼食物的动物。是的，没错，比如长颈鹿、牛和骆驼。我并不一直知道这一点，但一旦了解到后，我就无法停止思考这个词是如何完美地描述人类反刍行为的。我们不断咀嚼关于如何做出正确决定或重温过去错误的烦恼，这种行为以一种消极的方式反复进行，削弱了我们的专注力，最终在工作中损害了我们的表现。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
I'm Alison Beard. And I'm Adi Ignatius, and this is the HBR IdeaCast. Adi, do you know the origin of the word ruminate? I actually do. It comes from ruminants, those animals we love who chew their cud all day. Yes, exactly. Giraffes, cows, camels. And I didn't always know that, but once I learned it, I couldn't stop thinking about how it so perfectly describes what humans are doing when they ruminate. We're taking our worries about making the right decisions or replaying past mistakes, and we just continue to chew on them over and over in really unproductive ways that diminish our focus and ultimately, at work, hurt our performance.
我猜想，我们的很多听众，特别是领导者们，都会遇到这种过度思考的问题，即便他们未必会公开谈论。我是说，比如你得到一份评估报告，你的老板在评估中提到了六个积极的方面和一个需要改进的地方，你可能会一直纠结于那个负面的甚至是稍微负面的评价，因为我们很难放下这些问题。是的，没错，甚至半夜醒来还在想这件事。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
So I assume a lot of our listeners, a lot of leaders, you know, struggle with this kind of overthinking, whether or not they talk about it publicly. I mean, think about you get an evaluation and your boss tells you six positive things in one area that needs work, and you can obsess on that one negative, maybe even slightly negative thing because we have trouble letting go of them. Yes, exactly. And wake up in the middle of the night thinking about it.
今天我们的嘉宾将为大家讲解如何打破这种循环。Donna Jackson Nakazawa 是一位记者，也是《心智戏剧：反刍思维的科学及如何战胜内心的失败主义者》一书的作者。我与她讨论了当我们陷入这种思维时大脑中发生了什么，这种情况在工作中如何表现出来，以及最重要的是，我们可以采取哪些具体且实用的方法来停止这种思维，甚至将消极思维转变为积极思维。以下是我们的对话内容。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
So our guest today is going to explain how to break out of this cycle. Donna Jackson Nakazawa is a journalist and author of the book Mind Drama, The Science of Rumination and How to Outwit Your Inner Defeatist. I spoke with her about what's happening in our brains when we get stuck in this type of thinking, how it plays out at work, and most importantly, concrete, practical things that we can do to stop and even shift negative thoughts to positive ones. Here's our conversation.
如何定义反刍思维？你认为它如何对我们的职业生涯产生负面影响？
有趣的是，当我们查看关于反刍思维的研究时，发现有三分之一的人其实并不知道这个词的含义。这是个问题，因为我们比以往任何时候都更频繁地陷入反刍思维。所谓反刍思维，就是那些让你困在里面、不情愿地耗费宝贵心理能量的那些顽固、烦人的思维旋涡。即使你想摆脱它们，却总是难以脱身，或者它们总是诱惑着你再次陷入其中。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
How do you define rumination? And how do you see it negatively affecting our professional lives? Well, it's interesting because when we look at the research on rumination, we find that a third of people don't really know what the word means. And this is kind of an issue because we're ruminating more than we ever have before. And what I mean by that is those sticky, icky thought spirals that you get stuck in that you would rather not be spending your precious mental energy on, and yet you can't exit them. Or they keep sucking you back in seductively.
我们可以这样来理解这个问题。虽然我们并不想这样做，但我们总是反复去做。我们会一遍遍回想对话内容、在工作中发生的事情，或者是预测未来可能发生的事情。而这种反复思考通常伴随着对自己和他人的批评。简单来说，当我们陷入这种思维模式时，我们的大脑中正在发生这样的事情。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
We can kind of think of it this way. We don't want to be doing it, but we keep doing it. We replay conversations, things that happened in the workplace, or we predict what might happen next in the future. And often, our ruminative thought spiraling is marked by criticizing ourselves and criticizing others. And so briefly explain what's going on in our brain when we're stuck in these types of thought patterns.
这真是太有趣了，因为在过去几年中，我们发现沉思实际上发生在大脑的一个特定区域，称为默认模式网络。为了不让人感觉太技术化，我简单讲一下：这个区域实际上由三个大脑网络组成，一个在大脑前面，一个在侧面，还有一个在后面。当我们进行自我反思时，比如说：他们会怎么看我？我做错了什么？那个会议中的事情是怎么回事？我老板在那封让人琢磨不透的邮件中到底是什么意思？
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
It's so fascinating because over the past few years, we've come to see that rumination is really taking place in one specific area of the brain known as the default mode network. Not to get too techie on people, but it's an area of three brain networks, literally one at the front of the brain, one in the side, and one in the back. And when we're in self-referential thinking, what do I mean by that? Oh, what did they think of me? What did I do wrong? You know, what was that about in that meeting? Like, what did my boss mean by that cryptic email?
当大脑的那个区域开始自我参照的思考时，就像进入了封锁状态。它过度运转，我们无法摆脱这种状态。那么这在工作场所意味着什么呢？这意味着那个被“封锁”的大脑区域阻碍了其他267个负责创造力、构思、联结、解决问题以及健康讨论的大脑区域的正常运作。它们都被关闭了。当默认模式网络让我们陷入无助的思维循环时，与任务相关的大脑区域就无法发挥作用。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
When that area of the brain gets going on self-referential thinking, it goes on lockdown. It's overperforming, and we can't get out of it. What does that mean in the workplace? It means that that area of the brain on lockdown is preventing 267 other areas of the brain that allow for creativity, ideation, connection, problem-solving, healthy discussion. They're all shut down. Task-positive areas of the brain cannot function when the default mode network has us spun out in thought loops that don't serve us.
你提到我们现在比以往任何时候都更沉溺于反思。这是为什么呢？虽然没有人确切知道原因，但我们有很多不错的理论来解释这一现象。这些理论包括我们的网络生活，对吧？我们正在经历一场源源不断的负面和愤怒情绪的冲击。我们都花大量时间使用各种设备，浏览社交媒体，而这些平台的算法正在激发这种过度的情感反应。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
You mentioned that we're ruminating more than ever before. Why is that? Well, no one knows exactly why, but we have a lot of good theories about it. And those theories include our lives online, right? We're experiencing this unending firehose of negativity and outrage. We all spend a lot of time on our devices, on social media, which algorithms are spinning up that kind of over-emotional response.
在工作场合，我们几乎所有事情都是以数字化的方式来进行，比如用Slack、电子邮件，很少有面对面的交流。人类的大脑需要大量的背景信息来判断事情是否带有威胁，或者减少在社交和个人舒适方面的威胁感。当我们所有事情都在Slack、电子邮件或微软Teams上完成时，我们就很难获得那些用来判断是否存在某种社交或情感威胁的背景信息。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
But also in the workplace specifically, we're doing everything digitally, like Slack, email, very little face-to-face. The human brain needs an awful lot of context to discern if something is threat-positive or to reduce threat in terms of our social comfort and our well-being. When we're doing everything on Slack or we're doing everything through email or Microsoft Teams, we don't get the context to discern whether or not there is some kind of social-emotional threat.
大部分职场中的戏剧性事件，其实都是头脑中的纠结。我们会过度解读，比如思考：“那封邮件是什么意思？”或者“为什么那两个人在会议上达成一致意见？是不是故意排挤我？”这些思绪是在没有借助我们人类能够读取数千种微妙信号的能力下发生的，而这些信号其实可能只是告诉我们这件事情并不重要。但是这些能力在职场中似乎被我们抹去了。我们被教导要在工作中深思熟虑，特别是那些成功的人，他们知道如何应对风险，知道如何回顾过去的情形以确保在未来能够改进。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
And most workplace drama is really mind drama. It's that over-interpretation, that thought spiraling around, what did that email mean? Or how come those two people agreed in the meeting? It seemed like they cut me out. All of that that's happening without the context of our human ability to read thousands of micro signals that might just tell us that this is not a big deal. But we sort of erased them and lifted them out of the workplace. You know, we are taught to be thoughtful at work, particularly people who are successful. They know how to prepare for risks. They know how to review previous situations to make sure they can improve in the future.
那么，如何识别你正在超出那种积极的思考和分析，而转向更加危险和无益的境地呢？通常我们认为思考是件非常积极的事情，但我们必须能够区分健康的思考和不健康的过度思考。健康的思考包括生产力、解决问题、创造力、专注和构思，这些都是我们希望自己和同事拥有的好品质。而不健康的过度思考则可能带来负面影响。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
So how do you recognize when you're going beyond that sort of good type of thinking and analysis and instead veering into more dangerous, unhelpful territory? Right. So we tend to think of thinking as this very positive thing, but we have to be able to distinguish between that kind of healthy thinking, productivity, problem-solving, creativity, focus, ideation, all the good things we want in ourselves and in the people who work with us versus unhealthy overthinking.
所以，首先你要问自己的是：“这是我主动选择去思考的事情吗？”因为反复思考就像一辆失控的汽车，对吧？我们无法踩刹车，或者我们尝试了，但总是一次又一次地被拉回去。另一个可以问自己的问题是：“这是我第一次想这件事吗？”通常答案是否定的。我在洗澡时想过，在遛狗时想过，在做晚饭时也想过。我是不是在失去整段时间？
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
So the first thing you want to ask yourself is, is this something I'm choosing to think about? Because rumination is like a runaway car, right? We can't put on the brakes or we try, but we're sucked back in over and over again. And another question we can ask ourselves is, you know, is this the first time I've thought about this? Usually the answer is no. I was thinking about it in the shower. I was thinking about it when I was walking the dog. I was thinking about it when I was making dinner. Am I losing whole swaths of time?
你也可以问自己，这件事一年后还会重要吗？五年后还会重要吗？通常，这能很好地提醒我们，有时候我们纠结的事情其实在长期来看并不重要，但在当下却影响着我们对归属感的认知。当然，最关键的问题是，这件事情能让我有所进展吗？我可以告诉你，沉思虽然十分吸引人，它会给你一个答案，但这是一个虚假的承诺。最终，你并没有更接近解决方案。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
You can also ask yourself, is this going to matter a year from now? Is this going to matter five years from now? And that usually is a good indicator that we're caught up in something that really isn't going to matter in the long term, but it's mattering to our immediate sense of belonging. And of course, the big question is, is this getting me anywhere? Am I coming any closer to a solution? I can promise you that rumination is extremely seductive, that it will give you an answer, but it's a false promise. In the end, you're not getting closer to a solution.
好的。 所以，如果那些问题无法阻止你过度思考，你确实有打破消极想法的建议。 没错。 能不能向我和我们的听众介绍一下你的 MIST 技巧，并解释一下它为什么有效？ 我拜访了该国许多顶尖的神经科学家，努力根据我们在 fMRI 扫描中看到的内容，提出一个能够解开让我们陷入沉思困境的大脑部分的框架，并提出了 MIST 框架。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
Okay. So if those questions don't stop you from overthinking, you do have recommendations to break out of the negative thought. Yes. Why don't you walk me through and our listeners through your missed technique and explain why it works? So I went around to a lot of the top neuroscientists in the country and worked to come up with a framework based on what we can see on fMRI scans that will actually unlock this part of the brain that locks us down into rumination and came up with the MIST framework.
当然了，MIST是一个首字母缩略词，因为哪个作家不喜欢缩略词呢？M代表心灵影像。当我们反复思考时，总会在脑海中播放类似电影的画面，对吧？通常，这些画面是在为我们自己编织一个长期以来一直告诉自己的故事。你能否想想最近有没有什么让你反复思考的事情，就像不断重播的画面一样，然后试着识别出它呢？
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
MIST, it's an acronym, of course, because what writer doesn't love an acronym? M is for mental imagery. So when we're ruminating, we see a lot of movie-like reels that we load up time and time again, right? Usually these reels are creating a story that we've been telling ourselves for a long time about us, about ourselves. So can you think of something that you've been ruminating about lately that's just, you know, coming back up in the same reel over and over again and kind of identify it?
所以我的制作人让我思考一些我一直在反思的关于我职业生活的事情。于是我回想起一个老故事。虽然这不是我目前正在思考的事情，但显然这个故事依然令我难以忘怀。那时，我在伦敦《金融时报》工作，是“房屋与家居”版块的编辑，并且这个版块变成了独立于《周末金融时报》的部分。也因此，我每周五需要参加早上的会议。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
So my producer asked me to think of something that I've been ruminating about related to my professional life. And so I actually went back to an old story. So it's not something I'm currently ruminating about, but it clearly still sticks with me. When I was working in London at the Financial Times, I was editor of the House and Home section, and it became a standalone section apart from the Weekend FT. And as a result of that, I, on Fridays, would need to go to the morning meeting.
现在，早间会议由主编主持。报社里最资深的编辑们都会参加，他们会讲解当天要报道的新闻，比如利率上调、公司合并、军事冲突等等。而我，那时还是个年轻的女性，就会进去讲述我关于米兰家具展或西班牙房产的专题。因此，刚开始时，这对我来说是一次紧张的经历。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
Now, the morning meeting was led by the editor-in-chief. It had all the most senior accomplished editors in the paper, and they would explain what stories that they were running that day. And this was interest rate hikes, corporate mergers, military conflicts. And then I, a young woman at the time, would go in and talk about my feature on the Milan Furniture Fair or properties in Spain. And so it was a nerve-wracking experience to begin with.
有一天，我在谈论一次关于花园或家的采访，那是与前英国第一夫人切丽·布莱尔的对话。我误把她的名字念成了Cherry。当时我真想挖个地洞钻进去。我心里想着，天哪，我这下坐实了他们的看法，觉得我在一群重要的大人物中就是个愚蠢的小女孩。之后我想了很久这件事。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
And then one day, I was talking about an interview about a garden or a home with the former UK First Lady, Cherie Blair, and I mispronounced her name, Cherry. And I wanted to drop into the ground, and I just thought to myself, oh my gosh, I have confirmed their opinion that I am this silly little girl in their room of big, important men. And I thought about it for a really long time afterwards.
那么，告诉我，如果你当时认识我，你会如何让我不再去想这件事。我会从“MISS”框架开始，我会说，好吧，这是我从你那里得到的旧故事，用你自己的话来说。艾莉森，告诉我，你的旧故事是什么？可能是这样的：这是我作为一个女性如何被忽视的旧故事，或者是我如何找不到合适词语的旧故事。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
So walk me through how, if you had known me then, you would have made me stop thinking about it. So I would start with the MISS framework, and I would say, okay, here is my old story from you, in your words. Allison, tell me, what's your old story? It might be something like, here's my old story of how, as a woman, I'm dismissed. Or here's my old story of how I can't find the right words.
这是我的一个旧故事，说说我当时的经历吧。对，我想说的是，当我几乎刚从大学毕业就加入《金融时报》时，我有点感到力不从心。我明白，我确实需要和那些极其优秀的记者和编辑们一起工作，也需要学会如何与他们相处。很好，很好，就是这样。这是我过去一个觉得和周围人相比有些不知所措的故事。然后，我们要引入"I"，内心的情感，强烈的情感。每次我们重复播放这些情节时，都会产生许多情绪。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
So here's my old story of how, go ahead. Yeah, I would say, here's my old story of how, when I joined the Financial Times, almost directly out of college, I felt a little bit out of my depth. I see. And I did have to work alongside extremely accomplished reporters and editors, and I needed to learn how to hang with them. Good. Excellent. That's it. Here's my old story of how I'm out of my depth in comparison to the people around me. And then we're going to bring in I, which is for interior emotion, intense emotion. So every time we load these same reels, it gives rise to a lot of emotions.
所以我们要从“M”开始，然后将其加入到你的句子中。以下是我过去常常讲的故事，谈论我如何在有成就的人面前感到不知所措，这让我感到不安。好，现在再讲一次这个故事，我在有成就的同事面前感到无所适从，这让我焦虑。很好。因此，当我们这样做时，我们将进入“S”阶段，关注躯体感觉。就像我所说的，这是在进化过程中形成的生理反应，当我们感受到社交威胁时，会产生强烈的化学反应，体现在我们的身体上。所以这种不安感在哪个部位表现出来？
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
So we're going to go from M, we're going to add that on to your sentence. Here's my old story about how I'm out of my depth around accomplished people, which makes me feel. Okay, here's my old story of how I feel out of depth around accomplished colleagues. And it makes me feel anxious. Great. And so as we're doing that, we're going to go into S for somatic sensations. Those are just physical bodily sensations that, as I said, across evolutionary time, we evolve so that whenever we detect social threat, we develop these big chemical responses. And they show up in our body, right? So where is it showing up in your body?
我清楚记得那种脸颊发烫的感觉，对吧？嗯，还有那种胃里有蝴蝶飞舞，甚至有点反胃的感觉。是的。好吧，这是我以前的故事，讲的是我在那些很有成就的同事面前感到力不从心，这让我感到焦虑，胃里翻腾，或者其他类似的感觉。让我们来完整讲一遍。好的，这就是T，也就是来总结一下。这是我以前的故事，讲的是我在那些很有成就的同事面前感到力不从心，这让我感到焦虑，血涌上脸颊，胃里像有蝴蝶在飞。没错。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
I have a distinct memory of just like feeling my cheeks flushed, you know? Uh-huh. And also like butterflies, like sick to my stomach. Yes. Okay. So here's my old story of how I feel out of my depth with accomplished colleagues, which makes me feel anxious and my stomach churn or whatever. Let's do the whole thing. Okay. And that's T for tie it together. Here's my old story of how I feel out of my depth around accomplished colleagues, which makes me feel anxious and makes the blood rise to my cheeks and gives me butterflies in my stomach. Exactly.
好的。所以我们刚讨论的——心理影像、强烈的内在情感、身体感受——我们把这些都结合起来。这就是你的个人反思方式。有什么帮助呢？因为我们经常困在那些挥之不去的事情上，比如反复回想着昨天午饭会上的谈话，或者把收到的邮件读给配偶听好几遍，问：“你觉得他是什么意思？”这些经常出现在我们脑海中的故事，比如“我做得不够好”这样的念头，通常贯穿了很长一段时间。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
Okay. So that is missed. We did mental imagery, intense interior emotion, and we did somatic sensations, and we tied it all together. That is your personal rumination code. How does that help? Because often the kind of things that we're caught in that are sticking with us, the conversation we're replaying from the lunch meeting yesterday, or the email that we've read to our spouse three times, like, what do you think he meant by this? Often the story that gets going in our head, which is, hey, I'm out of my depth for you, I'm telling you yours, it's often a story that's run for a very long time throughout our lives.
我们的个人沉思习惯，就像是来自过去的信号灯。通过大量研究，我们发现，很多早期的经历并不会停留在过去，而是会变成一种模板。这意味着，在后来的工作中，即使是一封非常专业地对你的想法提出批评的邮件，也可能让你感觉不到中立，而是感受到对你是否重要和属于集体的一种威胁。我们反复思考的首要问题就是：我们对那些对我们重要的人和地方是否重要。因此，我们常常问自己：这样的思考是否有帮助？我们还使用了MIST框架来探究为什么这种模式会在我们身上反复出现。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
Our personal codes of rumination, they're signal fires from the past, and we had very good research on this, that often our early experiences, they don't stay in the past. They become templates, right? And that means that later at work, an email in which your idea is critiqued in a very professional way, it might not feel neutral. It might feel like a threat to your sense of mattering and belonging. And the number one thing we ruminate about is our sense of whether we matter to the people and places that matter to us. So we've asked ourselves the questions, like, is this helpful thinking or not helpful thinking? We've done the MIST framework to figure out why the pattern might be repeating for us.
但是，你也有一些建议，教我们如何在当下中断这些想法。即使我们知道这些想法没有帮助，并且知道它们从何而来，我们还是忍不住会被其影响。你有什么建议吗？是的，这些建议也是基于神经科学的观点，认为我们思考得越久，或者在某种思考模式中陷得越深，我们的大脑回路就会被强化，这使得我们更容易再次陷入这些思维模式。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
But then you also have some suggestions for just actually disrupting the thought in the moment. Even if we know it's unhelpful, when we know where it's coming from, we still can't help ourselves. There's some advice that you have. Yes, and that advice is also based on neuroscience and the idea that the longer we ruminate or the longer we get caught in a specific rumination pattern, which we all have, the more we're throwing down that neural circuitry that makes it easier and easier for us to get sucked back into those thought patterns.
我们想要做的是中断那些神经路径。因此，我们想通过语言作为逃离的入口，进行我所称的“快速中断”。这些方法可以非常简单。你需要找到适合自己的方式，这些方式需要在情感上与你产生共鸣。可以用一些简单的词语，比如“取消”或者“今天不行”。这里还有一个小技巧：当你用第三人称的方式提到自己的名字，或者用“你”来称呼自己时，大脑会更可能注意到。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
And what we want to do is interrupt those neural tracks. And so we want to do what I call ballistic interruptions by, again, using language as our portal to escape. These can be really, really simple. You have to come up with your own. Whatever really resonates and lands with you with emotional grit can be as simple as something like cancel or not today you don't. Now, here's another trick for your brain. When you use your name in the third person or you refer to yourself as you, your brain is more likely to pay attention.
我们越能够以对我们有意义的方式做到这一点，就越好。我曾与一位艺术家合作，她非常在意同事们对她作品的看法。她是一位才华横溢的知名艺术家，却无法忽视别人对她的评论。于是，她想出一个办法：她画了一个“rumination”（沉思）的字样，但把“m”划掉，变成了“ruination”（毁灭），并将它挂在她的工作室中。这对我们所有人都是一个值得牢记的好提醒。这样，她就能专注于推动她创作的创造力，而不是被他人对她作品的看法所困扰。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
And the more that we're able to do this in a way that has landing power for us, the better it is. I was working with an artist and she was really caught up in her colleagues' ideas of her work. And she's quite talented, well-known artist. She could not get the things that other people were saying. So she actually came up with something where she painted the word rumination and then she crossed out the M and it said ruination. And she keeps it up in her studio. That's a good thing for all of us to remember. So that she can get to the creativity that fuels her work versus caught in the thoughts of what other people think about her work.
是的，这让我想起了你推荐的另一个方法——写日记。为什么这样有帮助呢？写日记可以帮助我们把经历从身体中转移到纸面上，这样大脑就会感觉有一种释放感。我们有非常棒的证据来自James Pennebaker，他的研究表明，当我们记录那些让我们感到非常困难的事情时，它对我们的身体有可测量的影响。这很有趣。我自己不写日记，但当我心里纠结某件事时，我通常会给朋友打电话，一起散步，然后把心里的话都说出来。我一直把这看作是一种倾诉。就好像有些让我感到很糟糕的事情，我就觉得特别有必要说出来，把它倾诉出来。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
Yeah. That reminds me that journaling is another thing you recommend. Why does that help? It helps to get the experience out of our body and onto the page so that our brain feels a sense of release. And we have absolutely fantastic evidence from James Pennebaker that when we journal about things that are very difficult for us, it has like a measurable effect on our bodies. It's interesting. I don't journal, but I do when I'm stewing over something, tend to call one of my friends and go for a walk with them. And then I just sort of get it all out. I've always thought of it as sort of like confessional. You know, it's something I'm feeling really bad about. And so it's really important for me to talk about it and get it out.
这和我想说的是同一个意思吗？我觉得是的，我想稍微谈谈这个，因为很有趣的一点是，当我们和朋友分享一些正在发生的事情时，通常是一件好事。这是一种很好的应对机制，可以帮助我们摆脱反复思考的问题。数据显示，女性比男性更常这样做。这个现象被称为“关心与友好”。就像这样，你们一起走着，她在倾听你，帮助你从另一个角度看问题。你会觉得自己说出来了，被理解和接受了。我也想指出，我在工作中也这样做。我会找我最好的两个工作朋友，向他们倾诉，询问他们对事情的看法，以及我可以改进的地方等等。而且他们依然重视你，你依然属于这个群体，仍然被接纳。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
Is that the same thing? I think it is the same thing that I want to pick up on that for a second, because it's interesting that when we share something that's happening with a friend, usually that's a good thing. It's a good coping mechanism for rumination. And women tend to do that more than men, statistically. And it's called tend and befriend. It's like, okay, you're walking together. She's listening to you. She's helping you put it in perspective. You feel like, I got that off my chest and I'm still loved and accepted by this person. And I should note that I do this at work, too. I call my two best work friends and I vent to them and ask them what they think about how the situation played out and what I could have done differently and all of that. And you still matter to them. You still belong. You're still accepted.
但是，有一项关于我们称之为“共同反刍”的研究很有价值。这是个问题。这种情况是你去找某个人倾诉你老板做的事情，而他们回应说：“是啊，我知道。他上周也这样对我。” 然后谈话不断延续，可能还会有其他人加入讨论。共同反刍相当危险，因为大家会失去客观的视角。他们没有运用“MIST框架”——也就是说，他们没有去识别这里出现的旧有故事，而是完全相信一切，并强化对第三方、某种情况或某个人的负面看法。这就成了一个群体性的消极恶性循环。没错。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
But there is good research on what we call co-rumination. And that's a problem. That's when you go to someone and you unload about the thing that your boss did. And they're like, yeah, I know. Here's what he did to me last week. And it goes on and on. And then suddenly you might even get other people on it. Right? Co-rumination can be really dangerous because people lose perspective. They're not doing the MIST framework, right? They're not seeing, okay, what is my old story that's showing up here? They're believing everything and they're reinforcing others' negative beliefs about a third party or a situation or a person. A group negative vicious cycle. Exactly.
有哪些新技术可以在这方面有所帮助呢？我特别在想生成式人工智能聊天机器人。很有趣的是，人们确实会向这些AI聊天机器人求助以解决问题。但是，我想回到我们最初谈到的内容，那就是面对面与信任和关心的人交流效果要好得多。Ted Kapczyk 的研究表明，当我们与他人共处一室时，面对困难情境时身体会在神经生物学上放松，这会给我们带来类似安慰剂效应的良好感受，这些都是可以测量的。我认为我们永远无法从聊天机器人中获得这样的效果。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
Can any new technologies, and I'm particularly thinking about Gen AI chatbots, help in all of this? It's so funny because people do turn to AI chatbots for answers to problems. But I would go back to what we started with, which is that it's so much better to get this face-to-face with someone you trust and care about. We have very good research from Ted Kapczyk that heard that when we're in the room with another human neurobiologically relaxing about difficult situations, it gives us the same good feelings as the placebo effect, which are measurable. I don't think we're ever going to get that from chatbots.
你还提到了休息的重要性。我想说的是，当我在反复思考一些事情时，通常是凌晨3点醒来后无法再次入睡。那么，当这种反复思考导致失眠时，该如何解决呢？其实，我提到的休息并不仅仅是睡眠，而是指深度休息，也就是给大脑的心理休息。退一步讲，确实如此，你不仅在思考我们都会反复琢磨的问题，比如我们对在乎的人是否重要，而且还经常在凌晨3点左右的常见时间点思考。大多数人在半夜会进行这样的思考。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
You also talk about the importance of rest. And I would say that when I'm ruminating, it's most often at 3 a.m. in the morning when I've woken up and can't get back to sleep. So how do you solve the rumination problem when rumination is causing lack of sleep? Well, so when I talk about rest, I'm not necessarily talking about sleep. I'm talking about deep rest, mental rest for the brain. And just to step back, yes, you are ruminating not only about the number one thing that we all ruminate about, whether we matter to other people who matter to us, but also at the most common time, 3 a.m., that is it. Most of us ruminate in the middle of the night.
如果你想要获得深度休息，从而晚上能更好地入睡，最好的方法不仅仅是通过睡觉，而是通过一些能够让大脑在你清醒时放松下来的技巧。具体是怎样的呢？深度休息可以像是进行身体扫描这样的活动。我最喜欢的是由乔恩·卡巴特-辛创立的方法。我已经做了大约30年，现在可以在脑海中完成这个过程，我们在这个过程中让大脑休息，同时激活身体。瑜伽休息术（Yoga Nidra）是另一个很好的技巧。如果你不能做瑜伽休息术，或者不能做身体扫描，可以去浮力舱。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
So if you want to get deep rest, which will actually help you to sleep better at night, the best way for the brain is not just sleep. It's through doing techniques that allow the brain to turn down while you are still in a waking state. What does that look like? So deep rest can look like doing body scans. My favorite is by Jon Kabat-Zinn. I've been doing it for like 30 years. I can do it in my head now, where we allow the brain to rest while we kind of turn on the body. Yoga Nidra is another wonderful technique. If you can't do Yoga Nidra, you can't do body scans, go in a flotation tank.
浮力舱非常适合让大脑放松，并让整个大脑同步。我们试图减少不断发送给大脑的刺激，这些刺激让我们过度思考并使思绪不断循环，同时提升那些让整个大脑更有效运作的感受和意识。身体扫描其实很简单，就像是一种冥想，你需要依次关注身体的各个部位。顺便说一下，军队也在使用这种方法，用来帮助士兵在战斗结束后快速入睡。这种方法对于让大脑暂时“下线”并使整个身体和情绪系统恢复平衡非常有效。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
Flotation tanks are terrific for turning off the brain and allowing the whole brain to sync up. So what we're trying to do is reduce the stimuli that we're constantly sending our brains that make us overthink and thought spiral and up the sensations and awarenesses that make the whole brain productive. So a body scan is pretty simple. It's kind of like a meditation where you go through various parts of your body. Even the army uses these, by the way. The army uses these to help soldiers go to sleep very quickly after a day on a battlefield. It's very effective for taking the brain offline and bringing your whole physical emotional system into homeostasis.
瑜伽尼德拉非常棒。你会花很多时间专注于身体的微小部位，例如脸颊内侧或脚趾甲尖，直到你的左右大脑半球一起活跃。这就是主要目标。而且默认模式网络从某种意义上的“敌人”转变为“朋友”，因为这部分大脑能够带来我们都渴望的那种"心流"状态。说到这里，我想到下一个问题，因为你在书中提到，将负面思维转为正面思维是积极的，这听起来和你刚才提到的默认模式网络的转换有关。请告诉我具体是如何实现的，因为我对此有些怀疑。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
Yoga Nidra is really great. Like you just spend a lot of time concentrating on fine points in the body, like the inside of your cheek or the tip of your toenail until all your left and right hemisphere light up together. That's really the goal here. And the default mode network transforms from sort of our enemy to our friend because it's the same area of the brain that gives rise to that kind of flow state that we're all looking for. Well, that brings me to my next question, because you do say in the book that it's positive to flip negative thinking to positive thinking, which sounds related to that switch you just talked about with the default mode network. So talk to me about how exactly that works, because I am a little skeptical.
是的，我也是这样。我觉得，好的，你知道，这对我来说变得有点像激励鸡汤，而不是神经科学。我是一名科学记者，不过我很高兴地看到，事实上我已经在很多人身上成功应用了这一点。举个例子，如果你能让沉思中的恐惧为你工作，并成为你的朋友，那将会非常有帮助。所以这里我将使用一个非职场的例子，因为我们都有自己的生活，对吧？我们个人生活中的反思会影响到我们的职业生活，因为我们会分心，无法发挥最佳表现，绝对的。这可能不是你的同事，而是你丈夫早上在厨房里对你说的尖刻话，这种影响会伴随你到10点的会议。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
Yeah, no, I was too. I'm like, OK, you know, this is getting to sort of motivational fluff for me versus neuroscience, which I am a science reporter, but I take heart in the fact that I have used this with now a lot of people to good effect. So, for instance, if you can allow the fear that is in your rumination to work for you and become your friend, it can be very, very helpful. So I'm going to use a non-workplace example here just because we all have lives, right? And rumination in our personal lives leads into our professional lives because we're distracted and we can't perform at our best. One hundred percent. It might not be your colleague. It could be the snarky thing your husband said to you in the kitchen that morning is still with you in your 10 o'clock meeting.
这就是作为人类的一部分。我曾与一位女士共事，她的丈夫总是像个发牢骚的青少年，总会说一些让她久久不忘的话。因此，她开始不停地自责，责备自己为什么不能为自己发声，找不到合适的方式来回应他。当她开始搞清楚自己的反思模式时，她慢慢找回了自己的声音。有一天，我们在一起回顾她通过使用“MIST框架”和“快速中断”等技巧所学到的一切。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
That is part of being human. So one person I worked with had that kind of a situation, a kind of a perpetually cranky teenager-like husband who would say things that would stick with her for a very long time. So she started to beat up on herself a lot about why she couldn't speak up for herself. She couldn't come up with a good way to respond to him. And as she started to figure out what her rumination code was, the effect for her was she began to find her voice again. And so one day we were sort of unpacking all that she had learned by using the MIST framework and ballistic interruption and other techniques.
她开始意识到，虽然自己曾经因为长时间保持沉默而责备自己，但她也能转变心态，对自己说：「好吧，其实在这段婚姻里，我才有机会培养出自己的声音。」这种想法帮助她对过去的经历找到了些许平和感。我觉得这种情况也适用于处理一个特别难相处的老板。能够表达自己的想法，就是通过了解和打破我们冥思苦想的模式所获得的。当我们找到自己的声音时，恐惧也随之消散。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
And she was able to take that situation of beating up on herself for having stayed silent for so long and turn it around and say to herself, okay, but actually being in this marriage allowed me to develop this voice. And so that helped her find some peace with the situation that she'd been in. And I would say the same could apply if someone had a really difficult boss, right? Finding that ability to voice oneself, that is the thing that comes out of working with and recognizing our ruminative thought spiraling patterns. And when we find our voice, we lose the fear.
你是否认识或曾与那些因为克服了严重的沉思习惯而在职业生涯中更加成功的商业领袖一起工作过？我和很多人聊过，他们在各自领域都处于相当高的职位。我发现，当人们能够解决他们的沉思模式时，他们就不太会对周围的小事做出反应。他们减少了那些降低生产力的过度反应。这是一个非常重要的转变。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
Do you know or have you worked with any business leaders who have been able to become more successful in their careers because they've tackled a really bad rumination habit? Well, a lot of the people I had spoken with are at fairly high levels of what they do. And what I found is that when people are able to work through their ruminative patterns, they don't react so much to the small things that are going on around them. They lose the reactivity that takes them out of the productivity. And that is a really big deal.
他们也更能减少周围人所感受到的心理压力，对吧？所以，是的，我看到有人从困惑不已的状态转变为能够团结他人，从而为整个公司创造更好协同性的状态。听起来你的观点是，经理的工作之一就是确保团队成员不会有过多需要反复思考的事情，无论是因为有良好的心理安全感，还是有出色的沟通能力，或者是其他我们认为重要的领导技能。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
They're also better able to reduce psychological threat for the people around them, right? So, yes, I have seen people go from a state of more head spinning to an ability to bring people together that creates a synergy that's better for the entire company. So, it sounds like your view is that part of a manager's job is to make sure that their team members aren't given a lot of things to ruminate about, whether that's because there's psychological safety or great communication or sort of other leadership skills we count as important.
好的，他们已经训练自己去识别何时被触发，并且也训练他们的经理去识别何时被触发。同时，从下至上，他们鼓励员工在事情不明确时能够主动寻求更多的澄清。如果对员工留下了模糊不清的情况，他们可能会过度思考，对吧？我们不能只通过一封邮件中的五个字就读懂我们需要了解的一切。因此，允许员工向上一级的经理或老板寻求更多的明确信息，这是提供清晰度和允许寻求清晰度的双向过程。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
Right, and they've trained themselves to recognize when they're being activated and they've trained their managers to recognize when they're being activated. And on the other end, from the bottom up, they're offering the ability to allow people to ask for more clarity so that when things are really ambiguous, if you leave things in a really ambiguous way for your staff, they're going to ruminate more, right? We cannot read into five words in an email all the things that we need to read into. And to allow people to ask the next person up, their manager or their boss, for more clarity, that is a two-way street to offer clarity and allow people to ask for more clarity.
当我们消除模糊性并提供心理上的清晰、支持和安全感时，人们表现得会更好。因为你对此研究了这么长时间，有没有什么建议可以给领导者，让他们学习识别他人正陷入沉思并可以用你所提到的一些技巧进行帮助？我认为，首先，当你注意到一个人变得沉默或者他们的反应对当前情境显得过于激动时，或者更常见的情况是，管理者告诉我，这个团队不愿意和那个团队合作，或者这个管理者不想和那个管理者合作。那些人通常是通过他们长期以来形成的思维模式来解读正在发生的事情。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
When we remove the ambiguity and we offer psychological clarity and support and safety, people perform better. Because you've been studying this for so long, are there any tips that you would give leaders for learning to recognize when other people are ruminating and could be helped with some of the techniques that you're talking about? So I think the first thing is that when you notice that someone is being quiet or their responses seem overly charged to the situation at hand, or most commonly for managers, what I hear is that this team doesn't want to play well with that team or this manager doesn't want to play well with that manager. Those people are coding what's happening through their thought patterns that have often been around for a really long time.
但当经理们接受培训以识别他们自己的沉思模式，并允许员工寻求澄清时，很多问题就消失了。我想提醒大家，我们当中有三分之一的人甚至不了解反刍思维的概念。然而，我们每天至少有四个小时陷入消极沉思状态。这浪费了很多时间，影响了很多生产力。有时候，仅仅是进行这种关于反刍思维的讨论，并且让大家知道可以谈论这个问题、可以提问、可以将其作为对话的一部分，就能起到很大的作用。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
But when managers are trained in a way to recognize their own ruminative patterns and to allow people to ask for clarity, a lot of that goes away. I want to remind people here that a third of us don't even understand the concept of rumination. And yet we spend a good amount of at least four hours a day caught in a negative ruminative state. That's a lot of time. That's a lot of productivity. And sometimes just having this conversation around the fact that we're doing it and it's okay to talk about it and it's okay to ask questions and it's okay to make this part of the conversation can go a long way.
好的，Donna，非常感谢你和我在一起。我真的很感激。和你在一起很开心，Allison。谢谢你邀请我。那就是《心智风暴：沉思的科学及如何战胜内心的失败主义者》一书的作者，Donna Jackson Nakazawa。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
Well, Donna, thank you so much for being with me. I really appreciate it. It's great to be with you, Allison. Thanks for having me. That's Donna Jackson Nakazawa, author of the book Mind Drama, The Science of Rumination and How to Outwit Your Inner Defeatist.
下周，Adi 将与精益创业方法的创始人 Eric Ries 进行对话，讨论组织如何避免变得腐败。如果您觉得这一集有帮助，请与同事分享，并务必在 Apple 播客、Spotify 或其他您常用的平台上订阅并评分 IdeaCast。如果您希望帮助领导者推动世界进步，考虑订阅《哈佛商业评论》。这样您就能使用 HBR 移动应用程序、每周独家内幕新闻简报，以及无限制访问 HBR 在线内容。请前往 hbr.org/subscribe 订阅。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
Next week, Adi speaks with Eric Ries, creator of the Lean Startup Methodology, about how organizations can avoid becoming corrupt. If you found this episode helpful, please share it with a colleague and be sure to subscribe and rate IdeaCast in Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen. If you want to help leaders move the world forward, consider subscribing to Harvard Business Review. You'll get access to the HBR mobile app, the weekly exclusive insider newsletter, and unlimited access to HBR online. Just head to hbr.org slash subscribe.
感谢我们的团队，高级制片人玛丽·杜，音频产品经理伊恩·福克斯，以及高级制作专家罗布·埃克哈特。也感谢您收听HBR IdeaCast。我们将在星期二推出新的一集。我是艾莉森·比尔德。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
Thanks to our team, senior producer Mary Du, audio product manager Ian Fox, and senior production specialist Rob Eckhart. And thanks to you for listening to the HBR IdeaCast. We'll be back with a new episode on Tuesday. I'm Allison Beard.